


taking back what was lost

by voodoochild



Category: Boardwalk Empire
Genre: Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Missing Scene, Vignette, Yiddish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2012-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-28 16:31:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/309818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voodoochild/pseuds/voodoochild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Meyer has a long-overdue talk with AR after certain events in New Jersey. Spoilers for 1.10 and 2.12.</p>
            </blockquote>





	taking back what was lost

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Boardwalk Empire Comment Ficathon](http://cloudytea.livejournal.com/139537.html), for the prompt _"cause confidence is key when violating trust"_. Apologies to Toby Ziegler and the speakeasy for bringing the Yiddish without really knowing what I'm doing.

"We should talk," AR says, lurking in the doorway to Schekkler's, like he doesn't own all the real estate on the block.

It's not a good time. Meyer has an entire night's work ahead of him, pouring over numbers and papers. Once, he would have startled, cleared his desk of bookie receipts and bet logs and contracts with the opium dealers. He would have dropped everything for AR, because that was his job.

Meyer's just handed AR his new cash cow in a neat little white packet; Arnold can damn well learn to treat him like an equal.

He closes the ledger, stacks the piles of bills by denomination and then leans down to place them in the safe under the desk. Gives Benny a look through the doorway that means not now, and motions AR inside. Arnold looks amused, like Meyer's a prize filly just won a race at Saratoga by a nose, and it chafes.

"What can I do for you?" he asks, to be polite.

Arnold passes his hat back and forth in his hands. "Meyer. We become business partners and all of the sudden you forget your manners?"

The phrasing is deliberately Yiddish - AR never speaks the language in front of them, has only spoken Hebrew to Meyer once in regards to Abe the Just - and it makes the part of Meyer that still wishes for nothing more than to be such a man as Arnold Rothstein just ache.

"Arnold," Meyer says deliberately, "Now is really not the best-"

"Do you know why I said yes to you and Charlie's proposal?"

Meyer is tired of tiptoeing around. That strained phone call from Nucky Thompson. AR's pale complexion and marked silence afterward. The whispers from Jersey that James Darmody was out of the game permanently.

It would hurt less if AR were honest about it.

"Because Nucky Thompson just killed his son and you don't want to lose the closest things you've got."

Arnold looks up at him sharply, surprise all over his too-open features. Meyer wonders just what kind of suckers bet against the Bankroll, when his tells are so clear, so obvious. Perhaps he has simply taught Meyer too well.

"You boys know-"

"No, we don't. You tell us we're under your protection and you sell us out to Joe Masseria. You want us to go into business for ourselves, and you get angry at who we choose to work with."

"Alphonse Capone is hardly a good business model. Last year, he was shining Johnny Torrio's shoes."

"And James Darmody was Nucky Thompson's driver. Powerful enough to be a threat now, isn't he?"

"I didn't-"

Meyer stands, can't abide feeling as if he's been called to the principal's office. "No. You dismissed Darmody and you cut Charlie and I loose. And then you decided Thompson was an ally, and that, Mr. Rothstein, is not something I can overlook. The man held a gun to my head, or did you forget?"

Arnold looks cowed, regret tinging his features. "No, _boychik_. I could not forget something like that."

Meyer doesn't want to admit how the endearment affects him. He is Arnold's son in this, more even than Charlie, the _balebetishen yidden_ who has none of the Bankroll's failings and all of his promise.

"Then trust us," he asks, hand on Arnold's arm. "Let us show you we can handle this."

AR sighs, presses his hand to Meyer's cheek in a gesture he rarely uses.

"I'll never hurt you boys. Remember that."

Meyer knows the promise is heartfelt, but the history that echoes between him and Charlie and too many times when Arnold has already hurt them tells him otherwise. Late nights and cold stares and 14-hour poker games that are beginning to lose him money. Arnold doesn't know how hot he burns, or who he singes along the way.

" _Ikh getroyen du_ ," Meyer whispers.

He doesn't know if it's true anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> boychik - young boy/son  
> balebetishen yidden - honorable Jew  
> Ikh getroyen du - I trust you


End file.
